Five Years
by Lianne Yoffa
Summary: A 'What if Hiccup left' fic. In the arena with the Monstrous Nightmare, instead of telling Toothless to leave, Hiccup jumped into the saddle and flew him away, not to return for five years. When he finally does come back, we see a changed Hiccup, with new and diverse friends and allies, all of whom have accepted his new ways of training, rather than killing, dragons.
1. Chapter 1

So as you obviously know, this is a 'What if Hiccup left?' fic, where he disappears for five years before coming back with new friends and allies, all with their own dragons, to try to make things right between himself and his father, and between Berk and the dragons.

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"Stop the fight," Stoik said, standing up.

"No! You have to see this," Hiccup, in the arena with the dragon, which had almost accepted him, "They're not what we think they are," a few tense seconds passed as the Monstrous Nightmare slowly started to lower it's head toward the boy's hand.

"I said, STOP THE FIGHT!" Stoik shouted.

The dragon's eyes went to slits and it promptly started to attack the small, interesting human that had been trying to touch him. Now, the dragon was sure that the small human had been trying to lure him into calmness so that the big humans could do a surprise attack. The dragon got the human caged under one of his claws and was about to give the killing strike when something metal hit it in the side of the head. Furious, the dragon looked over to see the slightly more threatening young human that had thrown the painful thing, and chased after that one instead.

In a little cove in the forest, a black dragon suddenly perked his ears up at the sound of his human brother's voice raised in fear. The dragon, a Night Fury called Toothless, immediately began a frantic search for a way out. He jumped at the walls of the cove, scrabbling for a hold on the smooth rock. After a few fruitless attempts, he jumped, used his wings for a boost, and firmly dug his claws into the high ground he was aiming for. It was a last-ditch effort, but it worked, and Toothless was soon sprinting, flapping, and jumping through the trees to come to his human's aid.

As he reached the arena, he blasted an opening in the top half to allow himself entry. The plasma blast had the added benefit of creating a big cloud of smoke, which concealed his human from the bad dragon's angry gaze, and afforded Toothless with an advantage, as he could see better in the smoke cloud than his larger opponent.

Hiccup couldn't see much of the dragon fight, but when the smoke cleared, he was on the opposite side of the arena from the Monstrous Nightmare, with Toothless standing protectively between them, ready to attack should the red dragon make an offensive move. The situation was not helped when the arena was swarmed by Vikings, who took care of the Nightmare quickly before heading for the Night Fury.

Hiccup tried to tell his dragon to leave, but Toothless wasn't going. He thought fearfully of what would happen to Toothless if the swiftly approaching warriors managed to reach them, and he realised what he would have to do. Sure, it would mean abandoning his village, his family, and his possible almost-girlfriend, but it would mean keeping his first true friend out of danger. He jumped into the saddle, clicked the prosthetic tailfin into place, and took off just as Spitelout reached the place they had been. He flew out of the arena and almost left right then, but instead guided Toothless to curve around and land on the caged top of the arena.

"Dad!" he said, shouting so that he could be heard by the people on the ground, "This is what I was trying to show you. They aren't evil, mindless killers. We could coexist if we just tried!"

Stoik looked up at his son with an outward expression of rage, "This is what you've been hiding from me? This is what you've been doing all this time? I thought you were one of us! But you're not. You're no Viking, you're not my son. Get out of my sight!" only a select few people, those who knew the chief very well, could hear a slight note of sadness in his voice as he said the final few statements, and the last shout.

From the ground, no one could really see Hiccup's expression, and although many guessed, no one could truly envision the forlorn, shocked, or slightly resentful emotions that were present. Before flying away, Hiccup said, "I'll come back," but the promise wasn't loud enough for anyone other than himself and Toothless to hear. Faster than most eyes could follow, the dragon and rider were gone.

Astrid was sitting on that rock in the cove, the one where she'd been just before confronting Hiccup about his unnatural success in dragon training. Instead of an explanation she'd gotten the ride of her life, which had changed her views entirely. She shook the memories from her mind and looked to the sky, hoping to see who she'd come there for. Before going to Hiccup and Toothless's special place, she'd made a quick trip to her house to grab two traveling packs and stuff them with food and other, smaller necessities. She knew that if Hiccup were to stop anywhere before leaving, then it would be there, and she would be waiting for him.

It was hours before anything happened, and Astrid had nearly given up, when she heard wing beats and saw the familiar duo land just down the shore from where she sat waiting. She stood and waved in greeting as Hiccup dismounted and he walked over to her, Toothless following. Hiccup looked the most dejected a person could possibly get, which made sense, considering that he'd just been disowned, rejected, and pretty much banished by his own father in front of his entire village.

"Hey, Astrid," he said softly as he came within talking distance.

"Hiccup . . ." she started, not sure how to comfort him.

"Don't. I-I just have to leave for a while, until things cool down here," Hiccup said, turning as if to get back onto Toothless.

"Wait," Astrid said, holding out the two packs, "I'm coming with you."

Hiccup shook his head, "No, I need to go alone. You need to stay, to see if you can make them see what I couldn't show them."

Astrid wanted to argue further, but what he said made sense. He had to leave, otherwise his best friend would be hunted down and he'd be banished formally and officially. The way things stood now, all he had to do was wait for the right time to come back and no laws would stop him from returning, as there had never been a formal banishment ceremony. She had to stay, to do what Hiccup had been trying to do, and she wouldn't fail. When he returned, he would come home to an island where Vikings and dragons lived together in peace, this she promised herself.

"Okay," she said, much more softly than her usual tone, then thrust one of the packs out at him, "But at least take this with you. And promise me you'll be back." this last demand was said with the same fierceness that Astrid usually spoke with.

Hiccup nodded and said, "I promise," before jumping onto Toothless's saddle and taking off without another word said.

Belatedly, Astrid raised a hand in a goodbye wave, and stood in that position for a full minute after the duo had passed out of sight. With a sigh, she turned and slowly made the walk back to her house, not expecting that this would be the last time she saw Hiccup for over five years.

Hiccup didn't know what his destination was, or how long he'd be flying to get there. All he knew was that he and Toothless were going to get as far away from Berk as they could before stopping for a rest, since he just couldn't handle the stress of being too close to home after what had just happened there. He didn't notice the storm until he flew right into it and Toothless lost control.

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**Okay, I hope you all enjoyed that. If you think I should continue, tell me in a review! If you have any ideas of what you think could/should happen, PM me. **

**Again- REVIEW!**


	2. Chapter 2

**I actually got some pretty good feedback concerning the last chapter, so here's the next one as a present for all you lovely reviewers, favoriters, and followers!**

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In a very small village quite aways south of the Barbaric Archipelago, a pair of children were out after the first major snowstorm of the winter, searching for any animals that hadn't survived the night. If they came across something big, like a deer, then they'd have to share it with the other families in town, but they were hoping to come across some squirrels or other small game, to feed just themselves and their father for a few nights. They'd already had a bit of luck, with two small frozen rabbits, a frozen crow, and a large frozen squirrel.

The older of the two, an eleven year old girl called Luna, kept needing to remind her six year old sister, Eria, to stop wandering off and that they needed to stay close to eachother if they didn't want to get lost. Eria wasn't listening very well, as she was looking for 'snow gremlins', which would supposedly give you five wishes the first time you caught one, but take them all away if you ever caught one again. They also supposedly traveled in sleds that left big tracks through the snow sometimes, although walking was more common, according to Eria.

"Luna! Luna look! I found something!" came Eria's voice.

Luna looked around and realised that her little sister wasn't anywhere close to her, and that she most likely hadn't been for the past few minutes. "Eria!" the older girl called sternly, "Get back here right now or I won't let you come with me next time!" She started walking back the way she'd come, looking left and right for the small red headed form of her sister.

"But Luna! You have to come see! There's a boy and he looks cold," Eria's voice could now be pinpointed as coming from Luna's left, and the older girl altered her course accordingly.

"What do you mean, there's a boy there? Everyone except us is at that gathering thing back in the village," Luna said, getting closer to where she thought Eria was. She stepped between two pine trees that were slightly farther apart than the others in the forest, and found herself in a clearing about fifteen feet across on all sides, expect for a narrower portion off to her right.

Eria was on the other side of the clearing, and Luna was relieved to see that nothing looked wrong with her, but then she saw the boy her sister was talking about. He was on his back in the snow, his right arm bent at an odd angle and his left ankle looked to be twisted. There didn't appear to be any blood anywhere, which Luna was glad of. She could be rather squeamish when it came to blood. The boy didn't appear to be moving at all . . . or breathing, for that matter. Luna quickly made her way over to where her sister was trying to wake the boy up by poking his shoulder.

"Eria, stop. You're not helping anyone," the older girl said sternly as she got closer. She kneeled down next to her sister and leaned over the wounded boy, lowering her ear to his chest to listen for a heartbeat. After a moment, she heard a quiet, almost hesitant little ba-bump . . . ba-bump . . . She gave a sigh of relief. The boy, whoever he was, was at least still alive. No sooner did she have this thought than she remembered that they were out in freezing temperatures at least five miles away from their home, with no fast mode of transportation to get the boy back before he froze to death.

"Is he okay, Luna? Why is he sleeping outside?" Eria asked, not helping the situation with her six year old curiosity.

"He'll be fine, as long as we can warm him up and get him back to the village soon," Luna said reassuringly, more to calm herself than her sister.

Eria nodded, "So where did he come from?"

"That I don't know," Luna said, looking around for clues as to how the strange boy could have ended up where he was. There was a long trough carved through the snow, as if something big and heavy had fallen from the sky, and the boy was right next to it, the ground around him looking as if it, too, had been disturbed by something falling from the sky. The trail from the boy's fall seemed to branch off of the larger one and stop where he lay. The larger one, though, continued on, with a few broken trees along the sides of it that made it stand out more.

Luna stood and was about to investigate the larger track, when she remembered that Eria needed to be occupied at all times or else she'd run off and get lost somewhere. She turned and said to the younger girl, "Eria, get a fire started, over . . . there," she pointed to a nearby patch of ground that had less snow on it, "Clear away the snow first, and once you've got it burning, make sure the boy isn't too close or too far away. If the boy wakes up, ask his name and tell him yours, and see if he'll tell you how in the heck he got here," Luna gently dragged the boy closer to the spot where she wanted Eria to make the fire before standing up and going to check out the larger trail of destruction.

Looking back assured her that Eria was doing as she'd been told, so Luna followed the track until it ended at a place where the ground looked very disturbed, like something big had crash landed there but had gotten up again and walked around looking for something. What was odd, though, was that she couldn't see what it was that had been there. Judging by the size of the markings, whatever it was had been very large, so it shouldn't be too hard to see it. So why wasn't anything there?

Luna crouched down and touched the ground, trying to make out any specific tracks, when she heard and felt something breathing just behind her. It sounded big, and through her peripheral vision she could tell it was of a dark coloration. She knew it had to be some sort of animal, most likely predatory, so she braced herself for a claw swipe or a bite from whatever it was to finish her off. Nothing happened, however.

Slowly, Luna stood up. Whatever it was didn't react much, except that the breathing was now angled slightly differently, as if it had moved its head to keep looking at hers. Just as slowly, she began to turn around, to find herself face to face with a dragon. She jumped back, both hands coming up to stifle a shriek of alarm. The dragon wasn't attacking her, which made no sense because that was what dragons did. They attacked people. But this one, all it did was cock its head curiously at her and make a warbling noise in the back of its throat, almost questioningly. Its head came forward, and Luna flinched, but all it did was sniff her up and down, before suddenly drawing back and growling, its pupils narrowed into slits.

At first, Luna's thoughts were along the lines of, _'Oh, crap, it_'_s going to eat me now, I know it,'_ but then she saw exactly where its growls were directed. She had a hunting knife strapped to her belt, and the dragon didn't seem to appreciate the fact. On a whim, Luna pulled the knife out -causing the growls to get louder for a second- before tossing it to the ground a few feet off to her left. The dragon's eyes went back from slits and it looked at her again, as if judging whether she was to be trusted or not.

She never got the chance to see what it would have done next, as faint sounds of talking drifted back to them from up where Eria was. The dragon's ears perked up and it bounded away toward the noises, giving Luna the chance to see that it had a saddle on its back and that its left tailfin looked manmade. She had a few seconds to wonder about that before realizing that the dragon was heading up the track she had come down . . . which meant that it was headed straight for a six year old girl and a severely wounded boy.

Luna ran as fast as she could to get back -hopefully in time to stop any harm to her sister and the boy- but was surprised at what she saw. Eria was, of course, looking nervous and a bit scared, but it was the boy and the dragon Luna was looking at. The dragon had its nose pressed up against the boy's chest and the boy seemed to be . . . _petting_ it (with his left hand, that is. His right arm was curled into his chest as though in pain).

The boy looked over at Eria and said, "Come on, he won't hurt you. He's just-" the boy was interrupted by the dragon's tongue sliding along his face a few times, at which he said, "Ah! Eeew, Toothless, stop! Bad dragon! Stop it, Toothless, that's disgusting!" his protests didn't seem to do much to stop the dragon's display of affection, and truth be told the boy didn't really seem to mind.

Eria giggled and walked closer to the dragon, hand out like she wanted to pet it. The dragon looked up and froze, seeming to consider the hand, before leaning its head closer so the little girl could touch its snout.

"See? He likes you," the boy said as Eria started to rub all over the dragon's head. The dragon really seemed to be getting into it, when the boy said, "Wait, stop. Don't scratch him there," Eria paused, her hand coming away from a spot under the dragon's neck. The dragon looked disappointed, when one of its ears twitched and it turned its head to look at Luna. The boy followed the dragon's gaze and seemed about to say something, but Eria beat him to it.

"Luna! Come look! He woke up and he has a pet dragon! Come look!" the little girl said, as though her sister couldn't already see for herself.

Luna uncertainly started to come forward, stopping at what she judged to be a safe distance from the dragon. "You're . . . You're _friends_? With a _dragon_?" she asked incredulously.

"Yeah, I trained him," the boy answered. He then appeared to remember something and looked around at their surroundings, "Would you mind telling me where exactly this is?"

"You mean you don't know?" Luna asked, her mind still trying to catch up to what was happening.

"Nope, not at all. We sorta crash landed," the boy tried to stand up, using his good arm to get into a sitting position but falling back down the moment he put pressure on his leg.

"Don't stand up," Luna admonished him immediately, "As for where we are, I don't think you'll have heard of it. Rudich isn't exactly on any maps . . ."

"Rudich?" the boy seemed to think for a minute before saying, "Nope, never heard of it."

"Most haven't," Luna agreed. The boy shifted and suddenly clenched his arm closer to his chest with a small hiss of pain. Luna grimaced when she saw the weird bone alignment when he moved the arm, "You need to get back to town. Like, right now,"

"Yeah. Way ahead of you there," the boy said, his voice strained as he tried to mask the pain. He reached up with his good arm and patted the dragon, causing it to draw its head closer. "Toothless, think you could get down so I can get up there?" the dragon obliged, lowering itself to the ground. The boy tried to get into the saddle, but his injured arm and leg stopped him from getting too far. Luna stepped forward to try helping the boy up, and after a few failed attempts, he was up, although the physical exertion seemed to have taken quite a chunk from his energy reserves. Between deep breaths he said, "How would your village react to . . . this?" he gestured at himself and the dragon.

"How say you know how to train dragons?" Luna replied with her own question.

"Well, yeah," the boy said, his tone indicating that he didn't think he was really, really good at it, more like adequate, but Luna thought that if you were able to do something that amazing then there wasn't such a thing as 'only adequate'.

She grinned as she said, "Well, they'll probably welcome you as a gift from the gods if you can get dragons to stop attacking us, especially that kind," she made a gesture at Toothless, "Let's just say there's a bit of a Night Fury problem around here,"

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**Okay, so I hope you enjoyed that! I hope none of the OCs were Mary-Sueish at all. If you notice anything Sueish about anything, _tell me so I can fix it_! I don't want any of that kind of stuff messing up this story!**

**Do review! Questions, comments, criticisms, praises, pizzas and pies are all welcome!**


	3. Chapter 3

**Sorry for the short chapter. This is pretty much just filler, to show you what Astrid's doing while Hiccup's gone. **

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Back in Berk, people noticed something weird going on with Astrid. Now the top warrior in dragon training, they would have expected the girl to be happier, more confident now that she knew Hiccup had just been a fake, less . . . down. She still went to dragon training and was still top of the class, but she didn't brag as much as she used to, and she disappeared into the forest for hours at a time with no explanation of what she was doing.

Ruffnut in particular wanted to know what was going on. The two girls were good friends, but Astrid wasn't hanging out with her as much as they used to. One day, she saw the other girl going off particularly hurriedly and decided to follow. Tuff was sitting around acting stupid and tough with the other guys, so she didn't need to worry about being missed. Astrid was very skilled with stealth, so she was hard to track at first, but as they got deeper the other girl got more lax, giving Ruff room in her brain for idle thoughts now that she didn't have to use all of her concentration for one thing.

Dragon training wasn't as fun as it used to be, since most of the dragons had somehow busted out a few days ago, leaving no trace of where they could have gone. No one knew how they'd done it, as someone would have noticed if it had happened out in broad daylight or during a dragon raid. Recently the attacks had gotten worse, with the flying beasts seeming to be more numerous, but oddly enough that didn't seem to be the cause of the recent prison break from the dragon arena. The structure hadn't been damaged, and most of the doors had remained intact. In fact, if one were to guess without taking into account that no one on Berk was crazy enough to do this, one might think that a person had snuck down there, let all the dragons out, and somehow avoided getting blasted or skewered or bitten in half by any of them. The only dragons left for them to train against were the Monstrous Nightmare, which hadn't gotten out, and a Terrible Terror that someone had managed to catch.

Ruffnut was distracted from her thoughts when she noticed that Astrid was no longer in her line of sight. That was odd because the girl had been right there, maybe ten feet away, crouching down next to a rock. There hadn't been anywhere for her to disappear to, unless . . .

As Ruff got closer, she saw that the rock was set slightly in front of a small tunnelish thing leading downward, into what appeared to be a small cove. Ruff crept slowly down, wondering what Astrid was doing there. She came to a point where the sky could be seen through a break in the rocks above, and a shield was wedged between tow boulders, almost completely blocking her from getting further. Going under the shield, Ruffnut saw that it was, indeed, a cove that she had come out into.

What she hadn't expected to see was Astrid walking confidently up to a Deadly Nadder on the other side of the pond. She watched, speechless, as the other girl reached up and stroked the dragon's nose spike before pulling a chicken leg out of her bag and tossing it into the air for the dragon to catch in its jaws. Astrid then walked around to the side of it and in one swift movement jumped onto its back.

The Nadder didn't seem to want her to do that, however, and Astrid got back down, saying something to the dragon while she pet the side of its face. The dragon liked that, but then it caught sight of Ruffnut and gave a squawk before flying across the water and charging her.

"Stormfly, stop!" Astrid commanded, and the dragon paused to look back at its human friend.

Astrid sprinted around the edge of the cove to come up to her shellshocked friend. The dragon circled around to stand behind its human, curious as to what this other one was doing there.

"You- you- you have a dragon?" Ruffnut said, the implications of this still sinking into her mind. "Just like Hiccup did?"

"Yeah," Astrid said, as if this were the most common thing in the world, "This is Stormfly."

"But . . . how?" the twin was still nearly speechless. Hiccup the Useless, disgrace of Berk, doing something as stupid, crazy, and forbidden as befriending a dragon was easier to believe than Astrid Hofferson, top of the class and most popular girl in the village, doing the same thing.

"Hiccup showed me. Listen, you can't tell anyone about this, alright?" Astrid was suddenly serious.

"But- I- How am I supposed to keep _this_ a secret?" Ruff said, gesturing at the dragon and Astrid with both arms.

"Same way I did?" Astrid seemed to think of something, "I know! If you keep this a secret, I'll help you train your own,"

"My own dragon?" Ruffnut seemed much more interested now, and Astrid smiled as she started to explain what she knew so far from what Hiccup had told her about how to train dragons.

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**I hope you enjoyed that! If you want more little updates on the situation back in Berk or want me to just stick to Hiccup and Rudich, tell me in a review! **


	4. Chapter 4

Luna left her sister, the injured boy -whose name she now knew was Hiccup, of all things- and the dragon at the edge of the woods where the villagers wouldn't be able to see them. She wanted to brace everyone for the shock before waltzing right in with a _tamed_ dragon and the guy who trained it. As she navigated the familiar streets, she wondered at the fact that she couldn't see anyone out and about. Then she remembered the gathering that the elders had called for that day and redirected her route in the direction of the largest building in town, the gathering hall.

One of the elders was in the middle of saying something when she burst in, letting the cold air through the doorway as well. Everyone took note of the excited look in her eyes and her heavy breathing, as though she'd run all the way there.

One of the elders, and older man called Rion, cleared his throat and said, "Is there something you wish to announce, child?"

Luna, having mostly caught her breath, nodded vigorously and said, "Me and Eria found this boy out in the woods, and, well, we think he's the solution to our Night Fury problem." she said, talking faster than usual.

"How so?" asked the other elder, an older-middle aged lady called Briar asked.

"He -oh, you're never gonna believe this- he has this Night Fury, and he's _trained_ it! He rides on its back and it's friendly and everything!" Luna was practically bursting at the seams.

Around the small crowd came whispers and comments of a surprised nature, some leaning toward suspicious but most leaning toward relief. 'He _rides_ a dragon?' 'A boy, friends with a Night Fury?' 'The gods have answered our prayers!' 'I can't believe it,' 'Where is this boy?' 'Yeah, why isn't he with Luna?' 'Where's the dragon trainer?'

"Enough, enough. Settle down, Rudich," Briar said, holding her hands out in a gesture for quiet.

"They ask a good question," Rion said, "Where _is_ this dragon trainer you've found?"

Luna pointed behind her with her thumb, "I left him and Eria out at the edge of the village, close to Briar's healing house. He was injured when he crash landed here,"

Briar clapped her hands twice, "Kylinn, Moro, come with me. We need to get there and tend to this boy's wounds. Everyone else, please don't follow us. I know you're all excited, but crowding is never good for anyone." there was a collective moan of disappointment, but no one except the two assistant medics made to follow the almost elderly woman.

Luna wasn't quite sure what to do, as Briar hadn't invited her to follow but she wanted to go, so she could check up on her sister and make sure nothing else had happened in her absence. She looked questioningly up at Rion to see if he was going to tell her if she could follow or not, but instead he motioned for her to come forward, "Come, child. Tell us all exactly how you found this dragon boy,"

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Hiccup had passed out sometime between when they started heading for Rudich and when they actually reached the town limits. This was how Briar and her assistants found him, slumped forward in the dragon's saddle with little Eria rubbing the dragon's forehead. The Night Fury looked suspicious at first when the three approached, but he sensed that they meant no harm so he let them gently take his human brother off of his back and carry him into one of those weird structures that humans lived inside of. This particular building smelled of herbs and soup, and Toothless tried to follow the humans inside to see what they were doing with Hiccup. The old human, however, wagged her finger at him in a gesture that he knew meant, 'No, don't do that, you naughty dragon.'

He hung his head and slunk away, back to the tiny human that liked to rub his head right where he liked it. The little human giggled when he nosed her and tried to clamber up on top of his head, but kept sliding off because of his smooth scales. Toothless nudged her and jumped out of reach, initiating a game of tag. Somehow, the outcome of this was the little human attaching herself to the end of his tail, refusing to let go no matter how hard he shook it.

In the end, he brought his tail around so that the girl was upside down in front of his eyes, and gave her his crooked, toothless smile before holding her torso down with one paw and pulling his tail out of her grasp. He felt triumphant until he looked down and saw that she had now wrapped herself around his leg, which would be much harder to solve than getting her off his tail. He gave a little sound of dismay before proceeding to try pushing her off with his nose. The little human just laughed and held on tighter.

Toothless decided to try a new tactic, and fell over onto his side, playing dead. At first the girl laughed and bounced up and down on his limp and wobbly leg, but then she started to get concerned. She let go and ran around to the front of his head, poking his nose and worriedly telling him to wake up. Toothless cracked an eye open and waited for her to notice his amused look before getting up and pouncing, holding her down while he licked her face repeatedly, causing her to laugh and squirm, trying to get his foot off of her chest and hold off his slobbery assault at the same time.

One of the healers, a tall, willowy blonde girl called Kylinn, heard their racket and looked out the window to investigate. Seeing the dragon jumping around with the little girl brought a smile to her lips. Maybe this boy really could solve their Night Fury problem, if the way _that_ one acted was anything to go by.

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Hiccup woke up to the scent of chicken soup and healing herbs. He didn't want to open his eyes, but someone was gently shaking his good arm and he couldn't cling to unconsciousness much longer. He tried to sit up, but whoever had been shaking his shoulder pushed him back down.

"Wake up, dragon boy," said a kind female voice, "I need you to drink something."

Hiccup opened his eyes and rubbed them with his hands before looking at his surroundings. He appeared to be in some sort of medical house, if you considered the fact that there were six beds lined up on one side and shelves full of what looked like various medicines along the walls. One on end of the building was a door with a staircase next to it, and on the other end was a nice fireplace, which currently held a fire. Hiccup was in a bed toward the end closer to the fireplace, and a young woman was sitting in a chair next to him, holding a cup of something that smelled heavenly in one hand and another, much smaller cup in the other. Her face was shaped for smiling, her strawberry blonde hair was held at bay by a wide green headband, and her ocean blue eyes sparkled.

The lady smiled when she saw him open his eyes and held out the smaller cup, "I need you to drink this. It'll help relieve the pain in your arm,"

Hiccup went to take the cup but found that he couldn't move his arm. He looked and saw that it had been put into a neat splint and tied to his chest to prevent movement. He scooted back so that he was in more of a sitting position with his back up against the headboard, and took the little cup using his left hand instead. He eyed the murky greenish brownish liquid inside suspiciously, "What's in this?"

"Healthy things. If I told you, you'd likely throw up," the lady said.

"Yeah, not helping," Hiccup steeled himself, paused, then downed the contents in one gulp. "That was disgusting," he said, making retching noises.

"Now this," the lady held out the larger mug that smelled delicious, a bit like chicken stew but with more spices than he was used to. The boy gladly accepted that one. While he was sipping it -the broth was too hot to chug down like his stomach wanted him to- the young lady spoke, "Now, Hiccup, isn't it? Well, Hiccup, Luna, the girl who brought you here, tells me that you have an amazing ability. You can tame dragons,"

Hiccup suddenly felt more wary. The last time he let on about how he'd found out dragons were tameable, it ended with him being publicly disowned and practically banished from his home. However, she seemed to find his talent to be more of a good thing than a disgraceful one, so he nodded carefully.

"Our village needs your help," the girl had a gravely serious tone and expression as she spoke, "I saw the way that Night Fury acted around you and little Eria. I know that he wouldn't attack us. If you could get even just a few of the dragons that plague us to be like him, many of our problems would be resolved."

Hiccup was surprised, to say the least. Not only did this person not think he was a disgrace for training a dragon, she thought it was a good thing, something that could help people. Just like he did.

She continued, "Now, I know you might not want to help us, but-"

Hiccup cut her off, "What? Why would you think- Of course I'll try to help you,"

"Really?" the girl seemed to realize how unnecessary the question was and said, "Well, I'll have to go tell the leaders, then," she stood up and turned to leave. Just as she reached the door, she paused as if to turn and add one more thing, but seemed to rethink it and just continued on through the doorway. A few moments after she'd gone, Hiccup tried to get up, but his head started pounding so he reluctantly laid back down, expecting not to be able to go back to sleep. Despite his doubts, it was surprisingly easy for him to fall back into unconsciousness once he closed his eyes.

* * *

**I hope you people enjoyed that! Now, tell me if there's anything that you perceive as Mary-Sued or unrealistic about any of the OCs or situations, please!**

**Review review review review REVIEW! I'll be your best friend forever! **

**Oh, and also, Hiccup's side of this story is going to be rather OC heavy, so I can probably take some OCs that you people want to let me use. Even if it's just a name or appearance, I'd love to have anything you can come up with! (review are a great way to give me OCs, by the way *wink, wink*) **


	5. Chapter 5

**Thank you all for your wonderful OCs! And you, Guest person who left two reviews, I'll use some of your suggested plot points as well. I'll definitely be using all of the provided characters and I hope I write them how you imagined them! Anywhos, enough of my rambling, you want the next installation of the story! And here it is:**

* * *

Astrid and Stormfly, as she had named the Deadly Nadder she was training, had relocated from Hiccup's cove to one of the small islands off the coast of Berk. Sure, the cove was sheltered, far enough away that it was hard to stumble across, yet close enough that it didn't take days to get there, but it was still too close for her liking. After all, she had found it when it had been Hiccup's hiding place for Toothless, who's to say no one else would discover it while she and Stormfly were there?

Ruffnut had taken to coming along whenever Astrid went to visit Stormfly, and they were both given great appreciation for how Hiccup must have felt when he was hiding Toothless. They could only fly in areas where they were absolutely sure no one from the village could spot them, and they had to carefully avoid mentioning anything about Stormfly. Ruffnut found it difficult not to spill to her brother just how awesome it was to ride Stormfly with Astrid, especially when the other girl gave the command and the Nadder blew stuff up with its fire. Such sweet destruction . . . She wished she could get her own dragon.

Of course they had tried to get Ruff a dragon buddy, but neither of the girls had that gift with wild dragons that Hiccup did. Astrid could get rid of her weapons, use dragon nip, give it fish, scratch it in it's sweet spots and everything, but any wild dragon just wouldn't respond to her as well as it would to Hiccup, were he there. Ruffnut was still rather nervous around wild dragons, so she didn't even try.

At the small islet that Astrid used for training Stormfly, the two girls were hanging out around a fire that the Nadder had graciously provided them. Astrid was petting her dragon's head, and Ruffnut was cooking a fish over the fire.

"Hey, Astrid?" the female twin suddenly asked.

"Yeah?"

"Do you know if . . . Hiccup's going to come back?"

"He will," Astrid said with surety, "I mean, he'd better," the second statement didn't sound quite so confident.

"Well, everybody else has gotten so used to him being gone, I think his dad's even having the ceremony to make Snotlout the new heir soon."

"WHAT?! Snotlout?" Astrid said, and her dragon imitated her in agreement -in Dragonese, of course- although it couldn't have known what Astrid was mad about.

"Yeah, what's so bad about that?" Ruffnut looked a bit confused. As far as she knew, Snotlout would make a great heir. He would let her and her brother go yak tipping whenever they wanted and he could stop Stoick from getting them in trouble all the time.

"He can't! You can only get a new heir to a tribe if the first heir is either dead or banished," the other girl explained, "And Hiccup is most certainly not dead or banished,"

"Yeah he is," Ruffnut said, and when Astrid raised a 'Oh, really, and how is that?' eyebrow at her, she said, "His dad disowned him in front of the whole village,"

"Yeah, but technically Hiccup is still a member of the tribe, since there was never a formal banishment ceremony, and there was never a formal heir denouncing ceremony, either. Just because he's disowned doesn't mean he's not the heir anymore." It was true, in fact. Viking laws didn't say that if an heir was disowned that he was no longer next in line to be chief. They did say that if an heir is formally banished or formally stripped of their rights to leadership, _then _they can't rightfully take over the tribe when the former chief can't go on, but Hiccup had left before any of those ceremonies could be held, so technically he was still supposed to be the next chief.

Astrid really didn't want Snotlout to be the heir, because then he would get bridal choosing rights that she couldn't argue with, plus, she wanted Hiccup to have the technicalities on his side when he returned. _If_ he returned. What if he had found a place where he fit in, where they were nice to him, and didn't want to come back? He would at least come back for _her_, right? He promised.

" . . . and I think Tuffnut's about to figure it out," Ruffnut finished saying as Astrid realised she had zoned out and missed the first part of her friend's statement.

"What's he about to figure out? Sorry, I wasn't listening," Astrid said, making Ruff look exasperated.

"Really? And you people call me and Tuff easily distracted. I said, Tuff's getting suspicious and I think he's going to figure out about us and Stormfly pretty soon," Ruff said with a gesture at the Nadder that had curled itself affectionately around Astrid.

Astrid's plan had, this whole time, been to slowly reveal her secret to the other teens, getting them one by one to accept Hiccup's whole dragon training thing so that when he came back there would be at least five other dragon riders for him to see. She had, after all, promised him that she would try to get others to listen like he had for her. Maybe it was time to reveal it to Tuffnut? That wasn't the order Astrid had imagined it would go in, but if he was already close to figuring it out on his own then she couldn't deny it.

"We can always . . . show him," Astrid suggested.

"You mean it?" Ruffnut said, "Does this mean we can _both_ get our own dragon? Awesome! I can already see the destruction . . ."

"You know, on second thought . . ."

* * *

"Hey, Tuffnut," whispered Ruffnut, jabbing him in the arm to wake him up. It was the middle of the night and they had an appointment with Astrid. Tuff didn't know about it, of course, but Ruffnut had to get him up and out without waking anyone else.

"Huh? Wha?" Tuffnut mumbled as he shifted around, almost awake.

"Tuff! Wake up!" Ruffnut whisper-shouted.

Tuffnut sat straight up with a cry, only to have his twin's hand clamped over his mouth to stifle it. Ruff held a finger to her lips  
to signify for him to be quiet, and removed her hand when he nodded to show understanding. "What's happening?" he asked, looking around, "Is there a dragon raid?"

"No, you idiot, if there were we'd be hearing mayhem right now," Ruff said with an eyeroll.

"Then why are you waking me up?"

"I've got something to show you. It's really awesome. Come on, we've gotta be sneaky," she led her curious brother silently outside and down close to the docks.

"Okay, what is it?" Tuffnut asked, looking around.

"It'll be here, we just have to wait a little bit," Ruff said, looking at the skies.

"I don't like waiting, let's go destroy some stuff instead," Tuff said, already bored after just thirty seconds of waiting.

"No, wait!" Ruffnut grabbed his shoulder to stop him from leaving, "She's here," she pointed up into the clouds, where the silhouette of a dragon was descending towards them. Tuffnut started to look panicky, but Ruffnut got him to stay and wait for the dragon to land.

"You got him?" asked a familiar voice from atop the dragon as it came in close and landed.

"Wait, _Astrid_? You're on a dragon," Tuffnut said as though he was the only one who'd noticed.

"Yep, we noticed," Astrid said as she dismounted.

"But that's what Hiccup did," Tuff still looked very confused.

"Yes, it is what Hiccup did, and it's what I'm doing, too," Astrid said, patting Stormfly's nose spike proudly.

"Yeah, and me too," Ruff said.

"Well why are you showing me?" Didn't they realize that he might tell on them? Of course he wouldn't, but still, were they really that dumb?

They all heard a noise from one of the nearby houses. It could have been anything, some guy falling out of bed to keep sleeping on the floor, a bird or something landing on someone's roof, but it was enough to make Astrid tense up.

"We can't talk here," she said as she jumped onto her dragon's back, "Get on," Ruffnut obliged, but Tuffnut looked at them both like they were crazy.

"I'm not getting on that thing!" he protested as Stormfly walked right up to him and his twin pulled him up by the arm.

Stormfly took off immediately after all three teens were up, heading for Astrid's private little training island. Tuffnut clung to Ruffnut for almost the whole ride, but had to admit that it was rather exciting to ride on the back of a dragon. For the last maybe ten seconds, he actually loosened his grip to turn and look behind at how far away from Berk they were. _Whoa_, he thought, _Dragons are so much faster than boats . . . And they look way cooler, too . . . And they can breathe fire . . . I wonder how much trouble I could get into with one of these . . ._

When they landed, however, the thrill ended and he couldn't get off fast enough, resulting in a faceplant on the sand. Ruffnut pointed and laughed, but Astrid shut her up with a 'now's not the time' sort of look. "Tuffnut, get up, this is important," Astrid said.

As he got up, Tuff rubbed his head and asked, "So why did we have to come all the way out here again?"

Astrid sighed in exasperation, "Because I need to tell you some things that I can't go blabbing out in front of the entire village,"

"Oooh, like what, your supreme attraction to Snotlout?" Tuffnut said, then found himself clutching his bleeding nose moments later when Astrid punched him.

"No, like a promise I made to Hiccup that I need to keep!"

* * *

**((And now, as an extra little story hook, I shall give to you this little short that I forgot to include last chapter. (There didn't seem to be any really good place for it) Just to give you an idea of what the dragons think of the arrival of our lovely dragon/rider duo.))**

After Eria was sent home for dinner and Toothless no longer had anyone to play with, he took up a position outside the healers' building to wait for his Hiccup to come out. A female went in once, but when she came out a few minutes later she didn't have the dragon's rider. She had walked up to him carefully and patted his nose a few times before going off with some other humans around her age.

Toothless made the equivalent of a sigh as he lowered his head onto his front paws, eyes intent on the door that he was certain his Hiccup would come out of soon. The already setting sun sank lower behind the horizon, and the dragon picked up a faint noise coming from further inland. It sounded . . . familiar, but it wasn't something he remembered all that clearly. It had been so long since he'd met one of his own kind . . .

On the other side of the island, a pure black dragon caught a scent. It was familiar to her, but she couldn't quite place it's origin . . . Wait . . . Her large eyes got wide and her pupils went into slits. It couldn't be . . . She let out a roar that alerted the other members of her nesting community- _That_ one had returned! They would have to go out and find him, but first they had to make the right preparations . . .

* * *

**I hope you all enjoyed that, and whether you did or didn't, please leave a review! Just so you know, the last part of the bit with Astrid and the twins was not supposed to be a cliffie. I don't do those unless I have something very big and dramatic planned for the next chapter, or unless it's a perfect situation for one and I can't resist. **

**REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW!**


	6. Chapter 6

Luna was out early in the morning to check on Hiccup's dragon. It had somehow gotten into her head that it was her responsibility, since she was the one who'd brought it and the boy to the village. Eria had helped, of course, but she was too little to be responsible for anything much. The Night Fury was still waiting outside the healers' building, eyes trained on the door, when Luna found it.

"Hey . . . dragon . . ." she greeted it uncertainly, pulling out a bag that had a few fish in it in case the dragon was hungry.

Toothless turned and looked at her, then eyed the bag expectantly. Whenever Hiccup had fish with him, it meant that Toothless got some. The smaller female human might not have the fish for him, however. They might be for her, so he waited for her to make a move that showed either way.

Luna cleared her throat, "Hmm. Well. Uh, I brought these for you," she opened the bag up and pulled a fish out, unsure how to feed it to the dragon. She didn't want it to eat directly out of her hands for fear of losing a finger or two, so she decided on tossing it. The dragon caught it perfectly in midair, then turned its gaze to her, asking for more.

Luna blinked, "Nice catch," she complimented automatically, without thinking that she was saying it to a member of another species that likely couldn't understand her. She tossed another fish into the air, higher this time and a little off to the side, and Toothless caught that one perfectly, too. The next one was thrown farther and again, was caught perfectly. Luna wondered if the dragon's aim was ever off dead center, and decided to test it. There were five smaller fish left in her bag, and she tossed them rapid-fire in every different direction. The dragon didn't miss one.

"You're good," Luna said. She noticed the dragon turn its attention away from her and back to the healers' building. "You really want to see him, huh?" the girl asked sympathetically, "I don't think you'd fit through the door, but if it's any help, I think Briar should let him out soon. Maybe the day after tomorrow, or the day after that,"

Toothless made an impatient noise akin to a whine, but settled back into his previous waiting position. Luna looked around, not really sure if she should stay and keep talking to the dragon or leave and do something else.

"Hey, Luna!" came a female voice from behind the girl.

Luna turned to see two people approaching. One was skinny, male, had short brown hair, and wore a red shirt and a brown vest. The other was shorter, had long red hair tied at the back of her head, and wore clothes that looked good on her hourglass figure. The girl was the one who had spoken. Her name was Julia, and despite the four year age difference, she and Luna considered eachother friends. The boy was the girl's brother Jules, who Luna didn't know to talk much. A little ways behind them was a group of maybe four or five others who looked to be waiting for the two to do something and return.

As the pair got within a polite talking distance, yet still a cautious distance from the dragon, Julia smiled and said, "So, is talking to reptiles a new hobby of yours?"

"Apparently," Luna said, "And playing 'Toss the Fish' with dragons,"

"Hahah, yeah," Julia glanced at the dragon, apparently still a bit nervous about it, before continuing, "Well, me and Jules wanted to tell you that we're all going sledding if you want to come,"

"Who's going?" Luna asked.

"Oh, just us, Ellis, Rasha, Folk, and Verm. They found this really good spot that'll most likely melt in a few days so we want to get some fun out of it before then,"

"Maybe I'll go tomorrow," Luna said, with a glance back at Toothless, "I don't want the dragon to be lonely while he waits,"

"Are you sure that's safe?" Julia asked, "I mean, it might only act tame when that boy is there,"

"I think it's safe," Luna turned her attention to the dragon and continued, "Besides, it's not like he'll be doing anything except staring at the door waiting for Hiccup to come out,"

"Suit yourself," Julia said. As she and her brother walked away, she could be heard commenting, "Hiccup, what a weird name . . ."

* * *

Despite her intentions of waiting with Toothless to keep him company, Luna quickly became bored. _Very _bored._ Insanely_ bored. So bored that describing exactly what sort of bored she was might actually be something that she was doing to try keeping the boredom at bay. She wasn't comfortable enough around the dragon to go up closer to him and attempt some sort of interaction, but she wasn't really sure what else to be doing. She sort of hoped that one of the villagers passing by would require her help with something, but everyone else seemed nervous about approaching the dragon as well.

"Hey Luna hey Luna hey Luna hey Luna hey Luna hey Luna hey Luna!" came a high pitched voice from the girl's immediate left.

Only one person could make Luna's own name sound so annoying. With an inward groan, she turned to see none other than her little sister, Eria, standing there with a big grin on her face. "What is it?" Luna asked warily.

"Will you come and play with me? Lucy's helping her daddy fish, so she can't right now,"

"What about Luke and Taylor?" Luna asked, listing the first two kids she could think of who were Eria's age. She knew there were a few more, but her little sister seemed to mainly hang around with a few kids called Lucy, Luke, and Taylor. Lucy and Luke were twins and Taylor was their cousin.

"Eeeeeeew, they're _boys_. Why would I want to play with them?" Eria said, a bit of a whine making its way into her voice.

"I don't know, maybe so I don't want to wring your neck for annoying me all the time?" Luna said, crossing her arms.

"Why would you do that?" Eria blinked in her sort of cutely oblivious way.

"Because I'm annoyed at you," Luna said, then a moment later got a brilliant idea. "Hey, I know of a big, really important job that you could do,"

Eria gasped, her eyes widening. She never got important jobs, even though she was clearly big enough, since she was at the impressive height of just over her sister's elbow. "Is it hard?"

"Oh, yeah, _really_ hard. And we only let the best, most responsible, big girls do it," Luna said. She knew how to make her little sister do anything. Just tell her it was hard, required responsibility, and act sort of reluctant to 'let' her do it, and she'd go wild wanting to do it. Luna put on an unsure face, "Actually, now that I think about it, I don't think you're quite responsible enough. I know _I_ can barely handle it, and I'm older than you,"

"I can do it, Luna, I'm a big girl! Remember how I turned six last month?" Eria said.

"Hmm . . ." Luna pretended to think hard about it, ignoring her sister's please-please-please-please-please-please-please-please-pleeeeeaaaaaase-ing "Well, I guess if you really, _really_ want to prove it . . ."

"Yes, yes, yes! What is it?" Eria said, happy that her sister thought she was big enough for a tough job.

"Well, I need you to watch the dragon so it doesn't wander off or do anything that would get it in trouble. And you can't take your eyes off of it for one minute, or else it'll fly off and . . . do . . . something that you'd get in trouble for,"

"Like what?" Eria seemed to be getting slightly suspicious of her sister's motives.

"It doesn't matter, because you can handle the job, can't you? Big girls don't need to know what happens if they aren't responsible enough, because big girls are always responsible enough," Luna said.

"Okay," Eria said, convinced now, "I can do it! Now go away, I don't need anyone watching to make sure I do it right,"

"You sure about that? All right, then," Luna said. As she walked off, she wondered if Julia and all them were still sledding, and figured that the best way to find out was to go herself.

* * *

The next day, Hiccup still hadn't woken up long enough to come out. The same went for the day after. The boy just couldn't seem to stay awake for more than five, ten minutes tops, and most of that time was spent with the healers checking his injuries and giving him medicine. He had tried to get up and go outside a total of seven times, once each time he awoke, but hadn't managed to stand up what with his damaged ankle.

Toothless was getting restless. Not only was he unable to see his human, but no other dragons had made any appearances in the whole time he'd been there. That distant roar of a fellow Night Fury that he had heard his first night seemed to be the only sort of contact he would receive with the other winged reptiles. It was almost like he had somehow caused them all to disappear.

The townspeople noticed the absence of dragons as well. They would glance nervously at the sky every now and then, unwilling to believe that they weren't going to get any trouble from the fire breathers. In fact, people seemed more wary with the dragons gone than they did with the dragons attacking them. Some thought it was because of Hiccup having some sort of powerful aura around him that kept off hostile dragons, and others thought it was because the local dragons were still trying to figure out what to make of Toothless and the fact that he had a rider. As a matter of fact, it wasn't either.

* * *

Far off on a different part of the island, a Night Fury watched and listened to the surrounding land and skies. It was the same one that had first caught the scent of Toothless, and she was trying to figure something out about the scent. It _was_ his, she knew that, but there was another that was closely intermingled with it. The scent of something far younger, something that was kept close and protected, something that had been given fish from _that_ one's throat. The only times a dragon regurgitated its fish were if the fish was bad or for its hatchlings to eat . . .

The Night Fury's eyes widened. Not only had _that_ one returned, but he had brought with him a hatchling. She quickly spread this news to the others in the nesting community. _That_ one and its hatchling were in for one heck of a welcome . . .

* * *

**I hope you all enjoyed that! Do tell how you like/dislike the chapter in a review! I love reviews! **

**Speaking of reviews, I know I didn't reply to all the awesome ones I got for the last chapter, and I apologize for that, but I can give you your cookies at least! (::) (::) (::) (::) (:::) (::) (::) (:) (:::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (::::) (::) (::) (::) (::) (:::) (::) (::)**


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